Rate of serious injuries to PSEG workers has increased, LIPA trustees told

As it awaits word on whether it will be chosen to run the Long Island electric grid for another decade, PSEG was in the spotlight recently for missing a critical measure of performance: serious injury to workers.

In a committee presentation during LIPA’s board of trustees meeting March 26, a senior LIPA official and a trustee expressed concern about a "disturbing" increase in the serious injury incident rate among utility workers.

The rate has increased for each of the past three years, including five serious injuries last year, according to a report that accompanied the presentation. As the figures have increased, LIPA and PSEG last year enacted a "root-cause analysis and corrective action plan" to address the spike.

"This is significant to us and we take it very seriously," Billy Raley, LIPA senior vice president of transmission and distribution , told trustees during a board committee meeting. "We are very disappointed in this one."

"To me it’s disturbing because you can have an off year, that can happen in anything, but it looks like we’re looking at three years now, so there’s something clearly wrong ..." said trustee Dominick Macchia, an international representative of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers.

"We’re focusing our efforts on making sure people are paying attention ... when they’re out on the job," Raley said, adding PSEG also "takes it very seriously."

PSEG in a statement said safety was its "Number One priority," noting it has reduced its overall Occupational Safety and Health Administration recordable incident rate 78.2% since it began operating the grid in 2014. 

"We remain committed to our target of zero safety incidents and work to continuously improve the safety or our employees and contractors so our employees and contractors go back home the same way they came to work," PSEG spokeswoman Katy Tatzel wrote. 

PSEG's performance has been criticized before by LIPA and its trustees, over its management of customer call centers, a costly and delay-plagued transition of a computer system from New Jersey to Long Island, and its response to Tropical Storm Isaias, when more than 500,000 customers lost power for up to a week.

In December, PSEG reported to LIPA it also missed two critical measures of system reliability: one involving the duration of customer non-storm outages and another on the average frequency of outages.

PSEG receives bonus compensation for achieving around 50 performance metrics. A full report card for PSEG’s 2024 performance is not yet available, LIPA said. Newsday has reported the two prior year’s scores were under 70% of fully meeting the metrics.

Meanwhile, LIPA trustees are scheduled to meet in a closed-door session Monday to debate whether PSEG or another contractor, Quanta Services, will win the contract to operate the electric grid through 2035. 

At the March 26 full board meeting, LIPA trustees also held a closed-door session on the topic. Newsday first reported that Quanta, a Houston-based global energy-infrastructure giant, is also in the running. LIPA and PSEG declined to comment on the matter.

Quanta Services, in a statement to Newsday said, "Customers across America expect a better energy future that addresses their concerns over storm response, reliability, affordability, safety and customer service."

Quanta, which partners with another contractor to manage the trouble-plagued Puerto Rico electric grid, said it has more than 62,000 employees "who are experts and leaders in electric utility operations, electric infrastructure modernization, and storm and emergency response, including over 1,000 located on Long Island."

By Mark Harrington

mark.harrington@newsday.comMHarringtonNews

Mark Harrington, a Newsday reporter since 1999, covers energy, wineries, Indian affairs and fisheries.